Album Review
Hanni El Khatib - Moonlight
3 StarsFor all its flaws, it’s hard not to root for ‘Moonlight’.
If you need an idea on what a Hanni El Khatib record is like, it’s best to go straight to the source. “Songs for anybody who has ever been shot or hit by a train” he calls it. “Knife-fighting music” for people who, “if they saw a snake on the ground, they’d step on its head”, or “being stuck in the desert with $5, a knife and a muscle car”. Yep, El Khatib has already offered more quote-worthy snippets about his first two albums than I ever could. With ‘Moonlight’, the Californian’s third release, it feels as if he’s still working within the confines of his own self-branding, which stops this from being the record it deserves to be. Testosterone, blood, sweat and pain courses through the veins of ‘Moonlight’, but without a counterpoint it lacks the vulnerability or rawness that would make this a deeper listen.
If there is any truth in El Khatib’s sloganeering, it’s that ‘Moonlight’ really would make a great soundtrack to being lost in a barren dustbowl, somewhere along the borders of Mexico and the States. Each song is unsettled by El Khatib’s half-cocked vocal delivery, him sounding somewhat like a fever-dream messiah brought on by dehydration, while the slap-back treatment smothering his voice paints him as a zealous preacher addressing the masses from his rock’n’roll pulpit. Hear the big-top breakdown in ‘Home’ for proof (and maybe even conversion).
El Khatib easily straddles and steals from genres throughout the whole of ‘Moonlight’ – drumbeat-driven hip hop (‘Moonlight’), the stoner-rock monotony of ‘Songs for the Deaf’-era Homme (‘Teeth’), and even disco (‘Two Brothers’), all while underpinning everything with the 50s-meets-garage rock sound of his earlier releases. It’s this sonic-kleptomania that makes it even more difficult to work out why the entire album sounds, essentially, like just another Black Keys record, or a Jack White side project. Dan Auerbach’s role has obviously stretched further than just producing El Khatib’s second LP – he’s also made his way onto this record through musical osmosis.
For all its flaws, it’s hard not to root for ‘Moonlight’, and when it shines it’s a riot. The album’s killer opening volley will undoubtedly win over many sceptics, especially with the sexy-as-fuck ‘Melt Me’, and this album should plant El Khatib as someone to keep a close watch on. For now though, there’s still room for him to grow – another trip to the desert awaits.
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